Child Development
Children's developmental progress can be marked through physical, cognitive and language development.
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
Infants
Gross Motor Skills
4 to 6 months
- gains control of head
- rolls over
- sits when propped
6 to 8 months
- teething begins
- sits without support
8 to 10 months
-crawls and creeps
-pulls to standing position
Fine Motor Skills
1 to 2 months
- holds hand in fist
2 to 3 months
- grasps toy when it is placed in hand
4 months
- claps hands together
5 months
- grasps objects held near hand
6 to 7 months
- transfers toy from one hand to another
7 to 10 months
- perfects pincer grasp, using forefinger adeptly
Mobile Infants (8 to 18 months)
Gross Motor Skills
- Creeps
- Stands alone
- Can move hands in rotation to turn knobs
- Usually walks between 12 and 18 months
Fine Motor
- Stacks 2 to 4 objects
- Partially feeds self with fingers or spoon
Toddlers and Twos
Gross Motor
- Walks with increasing confidence
- Walks up and down stairs holding on
- Can jump off one step
- Runs with stiff, flat gait
- Climbs stairs one by one
Fine Motor
- Scribbles
- Turns pages two or three at a time
- Grasps cup with two hands
- Places pegs in pegboard
- Turns doorknobs, screws and unscrews
- Builds tower of 4 to 6 objects
Preschoolers
Gross Motor
- Walks erect
- Runs with control
- Marches
- Jumps in place with both feet
- Lands on both feet when jumping
- Kicks large ball
- Throws ball in an intended direction
- Catches ball with arms extended
- Walks on a line or low beam
- Balances on one foot for a few seconds
- Moves body without moving feet
- Rides a bicycle
Fine Motor
- Works 3 to 6 piece puzzle
- Cuts paper
- Draws variety of lines and shapes
- Builds an 8-10 cube tower
- Zips
- Dresses and undresses with some assistance
- Puts on shoes
Four Year Olds
Gross Motor
- Runs smoothly
- Gallops
- Skips with one foot
- Rides tricycle or bicycle with training wheels
- Pushes wagon
- Can balance on one foot
- Walks stairs with alternating feet
- Throws ball overhead
- Hops on one foot for four hops
- Creates movement to music
- Kicks accurately
Fine Motor
- Can work zippers and buttons
- Cuts paper in half
- Cuts on a line
- Pours liquids
- Buckles belt
- Builds bridges with others
- Begins to draw pictures that represent real things
Five Year Olds
Gross Motor
- Can hop, skip, climb, jump and run
- Catches a ball with hands
- Rides bicycle
- Descends stairs with alternating feet
- Repeats a musical pattern through movement
- Uses overhead ladder
- Attempts to jump rope and roller skate
- Walks on balance beam
- Climbs fences
- Skips alternating feet
Fine Motor
- Can write (not necessarily in a restricted space, letters are not uniform and reversals are still common)
- copies letters and numerals
- prints first name and simple words
- can draw a human figure
- models objects with clay
- can dress and undress self (may have trouble lacing and tying)
- cuts out shapes
- dials telephone numbers correctly
School Age Children
Gross Motor
- Rides a bicycle
- Runs, jumps, and climbs with greater fluidity
- Throws a ball better and farther
Fine Motor
- Writing improves
- Artistic endeavors are more elaborate
- Can assemble models
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
Infants
- Develops object permanence
- Solves simple problems
- Begins trial and error exploration
- Explores with hands, fingers, and mouth
- Begins vocalizations
- Understands the meaning of some words
- Follows a simple instruction
- Shows interest in picture books
- Smiles in recognition of familiar faces, objects, or sounds
- Imitates facial expressions
- Plays drop/retrieve games, pat-a-cake, likes to empty containers
Toddlers
- Shows increased interest in cause and effect
- Displays curiosity
- Shows interest in movement
- Investigates with touch and taste
- Begins sorting
- Uses manipulatives (tools)
- Exhibits unpredictable attention span
- Begins to work out problems through mental processing rather than trial and error
- Shows interest in naming objects
- Understands familiar concepts
- Remembers order – routine
- Exhibits action-oriented skills
- Builds small towers
Preschoolers
- Shows interest in dramatic play
- Begins reasoning and thinking logically
- Develops number concepts
- Learns matching, classification, and identification of shapes and colors
- Explores how things work
- Shows interest in producing designs (puzzles)
- Displays interest in senses and sensory discrimination
- Shows interest in symbols
- Explores and learns with their senses
- Expands vocabulary
- Asks lots of questions: why? How? What?
School Age
- Works in spurts, not persistent
- Exhibits letter and word reversal
- Learns to read
- Considers other’s point of view
- Plans ahead
- Enjoys collecting, sorting, classifying
- Begins math skills
- Begins to sequence events and retell stories
- Shows interest in games with simple rules
- Displays interest in “real” knowledge and things
- Sifts and sorts information
- Conceptualizes situations
- Handles several ideas at the same time
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
0-3 months
- responds to human voices
- smiles or vocalizes to initiate social contact
- cries when in distress or pain
- makes cooing sounds like “aaa” or “ooo”
3-8 months
- uses gestures and vocalizations to show interest
- babbles, using many sounds; will talk to self when alone
- laughs and listens to conversations
- babbles and combines babbles “babadadababa”
- turns towards sounds (music, voice, TV)
9-12 months
- understands many more words than what he/she can say
- looks at objects when they are named
- makes long babbling sentences
- shakes head “No”
- begins to say “Mama” or “Dada”
12-18 months
- says two or three clear words
- looks at picture books with interest, points to familiar pictures
- points or asks for what he/she wants
- points to body parts (eyes, ears, nose, etc.)
- uses vocal signals other than crying to get attention
- begins to use the words Me (mine), you, and I
18-36 months
- follows simple two-step directions
- combines words to speak in sentences
- listens to stories for a short period
- points to pictures when you name them
- knows own first name
- understands concepts of in, out, and behind
- uses descriptive words
- reaches more than 400 words in vocabulary
- increases vocabulary at fastest rate during 30-36 months
Three Year Olds
- Begins to understand statements involving time concepts
- Understands size comparisons
- Understands sentences expressing relationships using “if,” “then,” or “because”
- Follows a series of 2-4 related directions
- Tells about past experiences
- Uses “s” on nouns to express plurals
- Uses “ed” on verbs to express past tense
- Increases vocabulary to 1,000 or more words
- Forms sentences using complex grammatical rules
Four Year Olds
- Follows three unrelated directions
- Understands more complex comparisons (strong, stronger, strongest)
- Listens to long stories but may misinterpret the facts
- Understands sequence of events
- Asks “when,” “why,” and “how” questions
- Joins sentences together
- Tells about recent events that have happened
Five Year Olds
- Shows few obvious differences between child’s and adult’s grammar
- Communicates well with family, friends, and strangers
- Carries on conversations with peers and adults
- Uses intelligible speech, some sounds may still be mispronounced
- Takes appropriate turns in a conversation
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